A Not so Happy Halloween

The omen that signaled it all was Ava in bed around 5:00 this morning coughing a little. I should have known that bad times were a coming. The nose started running, the appetite went away, the moodiness began, and I can feel two molars hanging out below the surface of the gum.

Of course there is always tons of stuff to do on Halloween and yesterday was no exception. I rushed home, hurried Ava into her costume for pictures, and we took off into the backyard, runny nose and all. Thank God it was a beautiful day of it. Since I wasn't able to get any good pictures of Ava in her costume on Saturday night (I will post the rest of those Hall-O-Weenie Roast pictures later), I was determined to get a good shot. My camera has been acting up and not focusing right - {hint, hint to that wonderful husband of mine} so I decided to go outside where Ava loves it. She has been enthralled by pumpkins and loved touching, patting, and kissing them. I thought, what better than to have my pumpkin princess play with a pumpkin. Why in the world would I assume that this would be the 20 minutes that Ava decided pumpkins are just not that cool and it is much more fun to eat rocks? Needless to say, the pictures I did get were kind of blurry and I was kind of sweaty and in a foul mood. Guess Ava's mood wears off on people.

Next on the agenda was to carve one last pumpkin. This one was especially for Ava and had a picture of Uniqua on it. My hands were cramping and I had been working on it for quite a while when Ava came up and decided to poke one of her eyes out. Thank God for Bradley and toothpicks!

Our first trick-or-treater arrived at 5 and Ava ran to the door. I had to move her aside to get the door open and that's when the fit began. From then on out, the fits came quite frequently. Ava wanted to dump out the basket, Ava wanted to run around the yard and head for the road, Ava wanted to go with the other kids. On and On until I thought I was going to go crazy. After a disappointing 75 trick-or-treaters we took Ava to one house, Nana and Pop's. She was fine while there and then we headed home for bath and bedtime. I quickly followed into the bed and passed out, so exhausted after what is usually my favorite holiday. I hope next year is much better! But on a side note, as you can see from the above pictures, we handed out Play-Doh this year and the kids loved it! I was so happy to see the kids excited about it. It was so cute to see how happy it made the little ones to get Play-Doh.

Thank you to Aunt Bethany, Nana, Pop, Grammy, and Gramps for the cards and gifts that Ava got on Halloween.

Ava definitely should not be getting so close to Squiggles, especially when Squiggles is in costume.
Ava heading for the candy.


Ava loved Pirate Mickey and even said "Ickey" several times.

Ava's Uniqua pumpkin
Ava Trick-or-Treating at Nana and Pop's

One of the only good pictures I got of her.

I {Heart} Pumpkins

First off, thanks to Licia and Nana for the wonderful comments. I love hearing back from you guys so I know who's reading our ponderings. So thank you guys for taking the time to post. I love reading those little tidbits!

Now onto the business...

Anyone who knows me knows that I love fall and LOVE Halloween. So then you also know my love of pumpkins. On Saturday, we had the 2nd Annual Rogers Hall-O-Weenie Roast. Aside from eating, one of the big activities we do every year is pumpkin carving. I just love having lots of beautiful pumpkins and we always get tons of comments on them. This year, we carved 5 pumpkins and they are super cute. New to our pumpkin family this year are two white pumpkins and I just love the way they look. So without further delay, here are some pictures of the Pumpkin Carving section of the Rogers' Hall-O-Weenie Roast.

As you can see, Ava is kind of partial to the white ones as well.

"Here Mommy, I brought you this stem."

Ava with her giant coloring book and toddler crayons. She successfully ate 2 of the 3!

She did eventually get her head stuck and Grammy had to pull it out.

Joe carving the ole pumpkin.
The first picture of booger picking.
Talking to Gramps.
Exploring with Grammy.

My Dumbo pumpkin

Peyton and Joe
A pumpkin artist at work.

Ava is mesmerized by badminton rackets.

Anne and Joe carving away
The grand prize winner - My Dad and the skeleton pumpkin
My mom
Ava is helping out. That's my girl loving the pumpkins!
I swear, it took Bradley forever to cut into his pumpkin and he broke several little saws trying to get into it. The rind was super thick!

My mom and her rose from Beauty and the Beast
Anne with Donald Duck
Peyton with the castle that she and Bethany carved.
Two cuties

I will post more pictures probably on Thursday, so stay tuned.

DCHS Fall Fest

I have lots of catching up to do, so be looking for posts over the next couple of days to catch up on the happenings at the Rogers' House.

Last Thursday was DCHS's Annual Fall Fest. We were excited to take Ava to her first Fall Festival. Last year she was just too little so we skipped. This year, Ava was still too little to really enjoy it, but we had a pretty good time. Each club sponsors a booth and charges a different number of tickets to play or purchase items. Tickets are 25 cents each and we bought Ava $5 worth. It is very overwhelming when you go in because it is so crowded. Tons of the high schoolers show up and it tends to really put a damper on things for the kids. They just come to hang out and run wild for a couple of hours and makes it hard for the little ones to enjoy things. But anyway, that's just my opinion.

Ava started off at the booth where you paint a pumpkin. I wrote her name on it and she put a couple of stickers on it (which she later tried to eat). We did the duck pond next and Ava kept picking up ducks, sticking them in her mouth, and putting them back. Gross. She ended up winning a little orange bead necklace (which she later cried about when we took it off). She did the bean bag toss with Ms. Ann (one of the special ed assistants) and she really enjoyed that. She had a good time people watching and seeing all the other kids. She didn't cry at any of the costumes, though I am not sure if she even noticed. After that, I put a bid in at the silent auction, Ava and I got our picture made, and then we headed home.

So, it was pretty uneventful. Next year, I hope we can make it to one of the elementary school's Fall Fests because I think that would be more of our speed.

I am super busy downloading pictures from this weekend because I took almost 200. Check back tomorrow for pictures from our 2nd Annual Hall-o-Weenie Roast.

Here are some pics from Saturday morning. The ladybug costume is one my mom picked up on sale at Wal-Mart years ago. Ladybugs were my sorority's mascot and she picked this up for me. It has hung in a closet for about 8 years so I decided to put it on Ava. It is a 0 - 12 month size and it was so small on Ava. She laughed when she saw the head and enjoyed it until she tried to bend over and the crotch was so tight she would fall on her head. That is when the fun wore off and we had to really work to get this thing off of her!

Hello Kitty

Hello Kitty just never goes out of style. She is just as big now as she was when I was in grade school. When I went to a consignment sale this weekend, I found this hat. It doesn't really have a size, but the note attached to it said it would fit a 5 or a 7 year old. I paid my $1 for it and figured I could put it up for Ava and she could wear it later since I am sure Hello Kitty will still be in style.

When I was going through her stuff, she spotted the hat and was dying for me to put it on her. Of course, it fits even a 1 year old and how dang cute is she in it!

Just been busy...

Sorry it has been so long. We have been very busy and just haven't had time or really anything to post about. I haven't taken very many pictures lately, but I am gearing up for this weekend and our Hall-o-weenie Roast. We also have our Fall Festival this week at the high school so I am sure I will take lots of pics at that. Ava was too little to go last year, but I am looking forward to this year.

Anyway, as promised here are some pics of Ava after eating like a big girl.

And here's Ava's Mommy Has The Camera Out Smile